Our civilization is truly sliding into the cesspool and presumably will meet its Waterloo in the next hundred years, if it makes it that long. I talk about a rape that happened recently in what we call Greater Vancouver, actually being an outlying city in the Greater Vancouver metropolis. Unfortunately rapes happen far too often but there are several things that made this one different and indicates an even more frightening trend toward a disintegrating society.

The girl (sixteen years old is still legally a girl in this country) was given a date rape drug, taken out to a field and raped by at least five men. If that wasn’t bad enough, one news report said that up to 500 people at this rave stood around and watched.* Five hundred! Just watching. Not one of them called the police on their numerous digital devices. Not one of them seemed to think there was anything wrong with this scenario. Perhaps some did. Perhaps another girl did and she might have felt if she said anything she would be the next one raped. But really, five hundred of our up and coming generation had no respect for a person, let alone a sense of morality or right and wrong.

But this is not the only terrible aspect. Someone, if not several someones, took pictures of this rape and then posted them to Facebook. Hooray for social (or should I say antisocial) media. As fast as the police tried to move through and get these images down, they were re-posted. Not only was that young woman repeatedly victimized that night but she is victimized over and over again in social media. And the police seem to only be able to threaten people who re-post these images by saying that since she was underage it is considered pornography. Which really makes me wonder, is it then okay to post pictures of the rape of an adult woman? Can no one else see what’s wrong with this picture?

Our society has become so in-your-face with trashy reality TV shows of everyone’s drama (whether real or not and I doubt it is) and knowing what someone is doing every minute of the day through Facebook, texts, Twitter, you name it, that we can’t seem to separate true reality from the fake. And not only that, but morality has slid out the window.

While I do believe a healthy dose of reality, proper upbringing, conscience and a perspective of right and wrong will make most people discerning individuals, I also believe that we can blame the visual media for much of the blase attitudes and continuing (if not increasing) denigration of women, and people in general. Girls Gone Wild, and numerous other porn shows on TV or the internet show a free screw-anything-in-sight attitude that usually makes the women look like sluts and the men look like studs…or that’s what many believe. Add to that numerous shows that show sex only in a perverted or violent way, coupled with every form of violence and murder shown explicitly for almost any age and we have a society numbed to indifference.

Dolce and Gabbana thinks it’s sexy to show symbolical rape.

How bad is it? Am I just crazy? Well the few images on this page make a statement of how people might start to get confused as to whether rape is good, bad or sexy. Dolce and Gabbana thinks it’s cool to make it sexy, while others just think wearing a T-shirt is a funny ha-ha. A search of the internet shows spoofs of motivational posters with Rape in the title and some sick comment below. I’m not posting any here because I’m not aiming for adult content and I’m not willing to give one site any more traffic because of its complete disregard for the seriousness of this crime. Some of the captions say, just consider it surprise sex.

Unfortunately it is not sex of any kind for the person being assaulted. It’s pure and simple violence and an assault on a person’s life. Those that laugh would not be so free if the same happened to them, and the men who raped this girl, should they go to prison, might end up on the receiving end. Perhaps it really is time for women to be able to wear vagina dentata and if you don’t know what that is, all the better. I’m getting pretty sick of various crimes and supposed societies, cultures and religions that treat women as chattel, second class citizens or otherwise as something to be used.

I really hope the police charge every single person who stood around in that field watching, as accessories after the fact or accomplices. It’s a pretty sad state that supposed civilization has sunk to.

Update: According to the news today, (09/23/10) it was not 500 people at the rave but maybe only a dozen watching and maybe not 5 or 7 men raping her but just several. This does not lessen the severity of the crime at all but maybe still gives a faint hope for humanity that there weren’t 500 ghouls.

12 responses to “Rape: It’s Just a Social Media Trend”

This is why you have real trust-worthy friends’ look out for you in public places.

Some young women (and young men) think that bad shit will never happen to them. That it will always be someone else…

Where were her friends when this was happening?

I think that you take your chances when you deal with large groups of people. Sure, someone should have helped her and we have all the reasons why they didn’t (sacred or threatened, underage and or stoned in public), but this situation was bound to happen.

Anyone remember the movie: “Day of the Locust”?
A few years ago some sociologists conducted an experiment where they had a person in another room that was hooked up to electrodes. Then they had a few test subjects in to be asked some questions and if they got the answers wrong, the person in the next room was given a zap. The voltage administered would increase each time the subject made an error. You’ll be “shocked” at what they learnt about human behavior.

Unfortunately you’re saying that women shouldn’t go anywhere alone and that by saying “it was bound to happen” then what, it’s just part of life. This comes dangerously close to the arguments of “she was asking for it” because she wore a short skirt, a tight blouse, wasn’t veiled, walked alone. Human beings are animals and it takes wherewithal and conscience to keep from giving into our base natures. I’m hardly going to start now never going out because my “friends” couldn’t be with me and it’s bound to happen. That’s a bit defeatist or just accepting whatever comes along because that’s just the way it is.

And the Hotbed debate continues:
I grew up in urban Saskatchewan and I have seen my share of young girls that acted “slutty”. One was a close friend of mine and she was sexually aware and constantly flaunting, fondling others and had multiple partners BEFORE she was 16 years old.
When she yelled rape over being caught having sex by two boys, her case went to court. The case was thrown out of court – because of character witnesses having to tell the judge how she acted from day-to-day with men and boys for attention.
I am sorry, but like it or not some women and girls push things too far and then say no last minute and or yell rape. For them it can be misused: for control, attention and or empowerment.
My own personal experience I was introduced to sex when I was young and the girl was much older; but because we were minors at the time nothing could be done about it. So I know about victimization, because I didn’t consent to it. I am sure there are many more cases like my own that are shades of gray.
Now days nothing is clear-cut black and white and I doubt it ever was.

I came across this site in researching criticisms regarding the HBO series: “In Treatment” and am extremely disappointed as to the lack of information surrounding this series when it comes to the issue of rape.
Briefly, if you are not familar with this HBO series, (which I think that you can view free at HBO.com) it is about a therapist and the sessions he has with various people seeking treatment.
The segment (from the first season of the series) which I refer to is with a high school gymnist by the name of Sophie in the series and how she has a sexual ‘realtionship’ with her gym teacher.

A “relationship” – can you believe it????

What’s even more infuriating is that this therapist never reports this gym teacher to the authorities!

Sending the message…that what? Its OK for teachers to rape students????

What even tops that is what little I can find on the web about gross absence!!!!!

I know it is ‘only’ a TV series…but still – to me, it advocates by way of inaction and supports this notion that rape is not taken seriously which speaks to your article/blog and is why I am adding my comments here.

Thank you Colleen for allowing me an avenue in which to voice my opinion/observations.

Why are people shocked when they hear this?
Didn’t you have girlfriedn’s that dated people too old or too young for them?
And is that actually considered rape when it’s consentual?
So long as the guy isn’t 56 and the girl is like 12…

Hi Colleen. I think you may be giving social media a bum rap of sorts …it can be used for bad (like the situation you mention) and then for good as well; consider crimes and attacks that have been secretly recorded and reported to authorities. It’s all in the user I think. And speaking of users….

Not to defend the guilty (of which I feel, like yourself, someone(s) HAS to be charged) but crowds do have their own way …herd behaviour comes to mind. In this case it’s quite likely that those in attendance didn’t view this as rape but as something ‘more or less’ consensual. And if she was drugged then she may not have been coherent enough to be all that vocal. I know I’m making excuses for the crowd …but for the men who were with her I too only wish them to find similar treatment in prison.

I agree visual media needs to be more responsible …but then who’s going to enforce that without others crying foul over freedom of speech. It’s still, at its base though I think, an issue of power as Foucault wrote about, and if those in media find they can make money at the expense of others then they’re going to continue on. Of course they’ll convince themselves that what they’re doing is fine. Sadly.

You make good points, Troy. And if we call video a form of social media, the public would never have known about the RCMP taser misuses without it. However, it’s the posting of such images on Facebook and the complicit complacency that disturbs me. I guess I was never like that. I remember physically inserting myself between a friend and a bouncer about to pummel each other. Maybe that’s stupid but it stopped the fight and I wasn’t just standing by, encouraging such behavior by not speaking out. And really you’re right; this is more about the human animal than it is about social media.

Any kind of agruments or debate wont bring any solution. A new form of international law or united nations should see over it if any culprit is found.. Sould b awarded wit capital punishment.. No farther appeal should b given.. And it wil set as example to all. Human has a part animal to overcome that animality afear should be shown so they will thousand times before they act

My name is Thomas Dykes, I am the new editor of Craccum, the University of Auckland student magazine, in Aotearoa New Zealand. I have basically snatched control of the magazine from a section of the student body that find it acceptable to make rape jokes and included an article in the magazine explaining how to date rape. A hideous group of students. I am putting together an entire issue dedicated to rape, in order to inform and make the point, rape jokes arn’t funny. It is not acceptable in any form to make jokes that support an environment where rape is trivialised or even worse accepted as part of life. I would appreciate publishing the article above as I think you make the key points very well and are articulate in your arguement. I would appreciate you getting in contact with me, kindest regards, Tom: editor@craccum.co.nz